<meta name="dct.abstract" content="The Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) is an application-level protocol for distributed, collaborative, hypermedia information systems. HTTP has been in use by the World Wide Web global information initiative since 1990. This document is Part 3 of the seven-part specification that defines the protocol referred to as &#34;HTTP/1.1&#34; and, taken together, obsoletes RFC 2616. Part 3 defines HTTP message content, metadata, and content negotiation.">

</pre><p id="rfc.section.3.2.1.p.3">Content-Type specifies the media type of the underlying data. Any HTTP/1.1 message containing an entity-body <em class="bcp14">SHOULD</em> include a Content-Type header field defining the media type of that body, unless that information is unknown. If the Content-Type

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header field is not present, it indicates that the sender does not know the media type of the data; recipients <em class="bcp14">MAY</em> either assume that it is "application/octet-stream" (<a href="#RFC2046" id="rfc.xref.RFC2046.3"><cite title="Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME) Part Two: Media Types">[RFC2046]</cite></a>, <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2046#section-4.5.1">Section 4.5.1</a>) or examine the content to determine its type.

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<p id="rfc.section.3.2.1.p.4">Content-Encoding may be used to indicate any additional content codings applied to the data, usually for the purpose of data

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</pre><p id="rfc.section.3.2.1.p.3">Content-Type specifies the media type of the underlying data. Any HTTP/1.1 message containing an entity-body <em class="bcp14">SHOULD</em> include a Content-Type header field defining the media type of that body, unless that information is unknown.

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<p id="rfc.section.3.2.1.p.4">If the Content-Type header field is not present, it indicates that the sender does not know the media type of the data; recipients <em class="bcp14">MAY</em> either assume that it is "application/octet-stream" (<a href="#RFC2046" id="rfc.xref.RFC2046.3"><cite title="Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME) Part Two: Media Types">[RFC2046]</cite></a>, <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2046#section-4.5.1">Section 4.5.1</a>) or examine the content to determine its type.